ALBERT MEMORIAL, BELFAST.—Among the many splendid architectural structures in Belfast, few if any are more imposing and graceful than that shown in the present engraving. It consists of a clock tower in sculptured stone, and stands at the foot of High Street. It was erected as a memorial to the late Prince Albert, Consort of Queen Victoria, by public subscription, and was completed in 1870. It is of Venetian-Gothic style, and is 147 feet in height. In a niche facing High Street stands a statue of the prince. As Belfast is the center of the loyalists in Ireland, such a memorial must be taken to typify their sentiments, instead of those of the great mass of the Irish people. Belfast is a thoroughly modern city, its growth and prosperity being the product of the present century, owing to its favored position, and its being the center of the linen trade.

Featured Books

Ireland’s Welcome to the Stranger (also onKindle) is an American widow’s account of her travels in Ireland in 1844–45 on the eve of the Great Famine. Sailing from New York, she set out to determine the condition of the Irish poor and discover why so many were emigrating to her home country. Mrs Nicholson’s recollections of her tour among the peasantry are still revealing and gripping today. The author returned to Ireland in 1847–49 to help with famine relief and recorded those experiences in the rather harrowingAnnals of the Famine in Ireland (Kindle version here).

Annals of the Famine in Ireland is Asenath Nicholson's sequel to Ireland's Welcome to the Stranger. The undaunted American widow returned to Ireland in the midst of the Great Famine and helped organise relief for the destitute and hungry. Her account is not a history of the famine, but personal eyewitness testimony to the suffering it caused. For that reason, it conveys the reality of the calamity in a much more telling way. The book is also available in Kindle.

The Scotch-Irish in America tells the story of how the hardy breed of men and women, who in America came to be known as the ‘Scotch-Irish’, was forged in the north of Ireland during the seventeenth century. It relates the circumstances under which the great exodus to the New World began, the trials and tribulations faced by these tough American pioneers and the enduring influence they came to exert on the politics, education and religion of the country.